


Gatchaman Ficlets

by Todesengel



Category: Kagaku Ninja Tai Gatchaman | Science Ninja Team Gatchaman
Genre: M/M, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-29
Updated: 2011-08-29
Packaged: 2017-10-23 05:03:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 28
Words: 7,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/246534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Todesengel/pseuds/Todesengel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Assorted Gatchaman ficlets. Chapter titles contain characters and prompt, chapter summaries contain squick warnings</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Why (Jun and Ryu)

Jun didn't get.

Or rather, she got "it" -- got "it" quite well, in fact, having received one hell of an eyeful after she rather blithely waltzed into the dojo one day (but, really, who expected to have to _knock_ before entering a dojo?) -- but she didn't get it.

She didn't get 'why'.

"I mean, he's _Joe_. And he's _Ken_ ," she told Ryu over a beer after closing up the Snack J one night. "They should know better."

Ryu shrugged, expansively. "They do."

"And it's not some casual thing, either. It's not just the two of them taking mutual jerk-off sessions to another level, or Ken making one of his boneheaded leaps of logic and deciding that what Joe needs the most right now is a good hard fucking to take his mind off of the whole 'I sort of died' thing." Jun swiped idly at the bar's counter with a dishrag. "It's real."

"So? Is that such a bad thing?"

Jun nibbled on a strand of hair for a while before answering. "Nnh. Can't say for sure. I mean. It's Joe and Ken, we're talking about. The two most emotionally stunted men in the world."

"Yeah," Ryu said, "but it's _Joe_ and Ken. It'll work out."

"I hope so, 'cause I'll kick Ken's ass if he break's Joe's heart." Jun ran a practiced eye over the bottles on the back wall, checking to see if Jinpei had been at them again. "He's only human, after all."


	2. Speeding (Ken/Joe)

"Don't even start," Ken said when Joe picked him up, and Joe just put on his best, 'who, me?' face and paid Ken's bail and let him sulk all the way to the very abandoned field about three kilometers outside of town, where he produced lube and a box of condoms and let Ken fuck him until the sulky pout disappeared from his face (which Joe thought was a shame because Ken did do pouty very well) and the sleepy, sated almost-smile took its place. _Then_ he propped himself up on his elbow, then, and looked over at Ken, and said, "Okay, but here's the thing I don't get. How do you get arrested for speeding when you're in a fucking plane?"


	3. Fury (Jinpei)

Jinpei didn't think about things like courage and cowardice. It wasn't courage that made him go out as the Swallow and face monsters every day, it was just what he did, who he was. And anyway, as he would have told anybody who asked (and he really only meant the rest of the Ninjatai, 'cause they were the only people that counted to him), after facing a pissed off Jun, a giant mechanical turtle was really just not all that scary.


	4. No Free Lunch (Jun)

"Thanks, Junie," Ken called as he left, and Jun didn't bother to shout after him, "There's no such thing as a free lunch!" She just carefully added up everything he'd eaten -- and if Jun didn't know that he had the metabolism of a hummingbird, she'd be wondering why he wasn’t 300 pounds -- and slipped the receipt into the front of the rather thick accordion file folder she kept with his name on it. (She was going to have to get another one soon, or start using some string to tie the thing closed.) Someday in the future, she was going to take Ken back here, and lock the door, and show him this folder. And then he'd really learn that there was no such thing as a free lunch.


	5. Personal Space (Jun)

The worst part about being part of the Ninjatai was that there was a complete lack of understanding about the whole concept of personal space. The worst part about being the only girl on the Ninjatai was that it was like having four extremely over-protective, suspicious, _nosy_ brothers. And, okay, maybe Jun should have taken the guy up on his offer to go back to his place, but her's had been closer and how was she supposed to know that tonight would be the night Ken felt the need for a heart-to-heart? Or that he'd decide that it was perfectly within his rights to pick the lock on her door and walk in on her?

"You, stay," she told the guy as she wrapped a sheet around her body and headed downstairs to see if Ken had broken anything when he'd fallen.

"Junie, you, he." Ken's face was red and he was having a hard time looking her in the eyes, and Jun was just getting seriously annoyed. "I thought. I mean. You and me."

"Ken," she said as she crouched down in front of him, "I'm seventeen and I run a bar. Did you really think I was still a virgin?"


	6. Competition (Joe/Ken)

"The score's 180 to 160" Ken said, and he twirled his birdrang around his finger. "And I can keep going all day."

"Yeah, well, you're only scoring higher 'cause you're taking the fucking head off of every goddamn target," Joe growled. "Ain't you ever heard of precision?"

"Gets the job done." Ken smirked at him. "So? You going to hunt up another box of ammo or are you going to admit that your little pea shooter just isn't up to the challenge?"

Joe snarled but holstered his gun; Hakase got on his case enough already about wasting ammo. "Fine," he said, "I'll admit you do more damage." And he grabbed Ken's wrist and pulled him in close, slid his hand down Ken's pants and grinned as he watched Ken shiver and bite back moan. "But we both know I'm better."


	7. Distance (Ken/Joe)

He dreamed of running. Running endlessly, down an anonymous corridor, running after a figure that was always just out of his reach, always just beyond his grasp, and he woke up panting and sobbing and feeling lost and alone.

"Hey, hey," Joe said, and he pulled Ken in close, and Ken clung to him as tight as he could, held him as close as he could until there was nothing between their bodies, not even air.

"Couldn't reach you," he sobbed, "I couldn't reach you. You weren't there."

"Shh, shh," Joe said, and he stroked Ken's back. "I'm here. I'm here."


	8. Breadcrumbs (Ken/Joe)

Ken's door was unlocked and under normal circumstances Ken would've suspected that Joe'd come over for a beer and forgot to lock up after himself, but whenever Joe came over there was usually some sort of corroborating evidence. Like a car. Or, y'know, Joe himself.

Since the exterior of his little shack was distinctly lacking in either race cars or Joe, Ken figured someone had finally gotten desperate enough to break into his place, so he grabbed the baseball bat he kept in the back of his car and slowly pushed the door open.

It looked normal enough inside. There was no real additional evidence of a general ransacking but then again since his place generally looked fairly well ransacked to begin with, this wasn't necessarily proof that he hadn't been robbed.

The photograph of Joe smiling his "Hey, let's have sex!" smile that was taped to the wall with an arrow pointing down the hall drawn right underneath it probably was.

Ken put the baseball bat down in the corner by his front door and took the picture of Joe down. He followed the arrow, and there was another picture of Joe with more smile and less clothing.

Ken raised an eyebrow.

This was either some elaborate sex game Joe was playing or…

Well, okay, Ken couldn't really think of an "or" right now because six months of sex with Joe had pretty much hard-wired _that_ particular smile to the "OMG!SEX!" part of Ken's brain and while he wasn't painfully hard (yet), he was definitely starting to feel a certain familiar tightness in the crotch region.

Another arrow and another picture – taped to the bedroom door this time – and Ken had a brief moment of paranoid panic at the thought that this might be some kind of horribly elaborate trap, except at this point he kind of didn't care because this time Joe was pretty much naked in that picture (except for those godawful smiley face boxers he insisted on wearing) and the sight of a mostly naked Joe had been hardwired to the "SEX!NOW!" parts of Ken's brain long before he'd known just how much fun sex with Joe could be.

Life, the Universe, and Everything didn't even come a close second to the prospect of sex with Joe.

Of course, if the only thing behind that door was another picture of Joe, Ken was probably going to have to do something drastic and violent.

Ken pushed the door to his room open.

"Took you long enough," Joe said glaring at him from where he lay chained to Ken's bed, not exactly smiling but definitely and completely naked. "Jesus. It's not like this place is so huge you could get lost or anything."

"Sorry," Ken said, grinning as he closed the door behind him. "I was distracted by your breadcrumbs."

 **(some time after the sex)**

Ken finished unlocking the handcuffs and glared at Joe. "You so owe me a new headboard."

"Hey," Joe said, rubbing his wrists. "The handcuffs weren't my idea."

"Uh huh." Ken twirled the handcuffs on one finger. "So. Just how jealous should I be right now?"

Joe coughed and the tips of his ears went red. "Look, I owed Jun money, and after the sixth beer it really did seem like a good idea."


	9. Jealousy (Ken/Joe)

Ken knew that even under normal circumstances it was stupid to be jealous of a car, and so he really didn't want to think about what it said about him that his jealousy was directed not at Joe for owning the car, but at the G2 itself.

Idiotic was probably an understatement.

The fact that he was currently engaged in a staring contest with the car probably raised his 'stupid' quotient to uncharted heights.

And of course Joe completely misinterpreted the reason for his glower, because he stopped futzing with whatever it was he was futzing around with under the G2's hood and said, in a tone that held more exasperation than was really warranted in Ken's opinion, "Jesus, Ken, it's just routine maintenance. She'll be up and running before the next Mech attack."

Not that Ken was really complaining about Joe's obliviousness; as stupid as he felt for glaring at the car in the first place, he knew it'd be a thousand times worse if Joe knew the truth.


	10. Coma!sex (Ken/Joe)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dubious consent, non-consensual drug use.

Joe almost felt bad about it, but by the time the tattered shreds of his conscience managed to fight their way past his fully intact libido, he'd already drugged Ken and had his mouth around Ken's cock and, really. It was kind of too late to stop then, especially with the panting, needy noises Ken was making, all soft and unguarded and.

Well. Even if it was his conscience it was still a part of Joe, and, really. It couldn't argue with that.

 

*

Ken figured it out about the seventh time he'd let Joe make the coffee and then woke up six hours later and feeling both extremely relaxed and also a strange, lingering sensation in the nether regions. Although admittedly when he said he'd figured it out, the only part he'd _actually_ figured out was that Joe was drugging him.

He'd had _absolutely_ no idea that Joe was drugging him and then having sex with him.

Or that Joe was really, really good at fellatio, and he almost let Joe know that he was awake there, because, damn. Joe could hold his breath for a long time.

He didn't let Joe make the coffee for a little while after that, mostly because he wasn't quite sure if he should (a) call Joe on it or (b) see what was so fascinating about the whole having sex with unconscious people.

His head said he needed to put an end to this before it got _really_ out of hand.

His dick -- which kind of missed Joe a lot, these days -- said, okay, yes, the whole unconscious sex thing was kind of bad, but, well, wasn't it better to understand _why_ Joe did it so they could seek proper treatment?

You just want to have some more sex, his head said.

Well, duh. I _am_ a sex organ, his dick replied.

At which point Ken decided that maybe _he_ was the one who needed some help if his various and assorted body parts were having conversations. Or maybe this was some strange side effect of the drug Joe was using, and he'd meant to just take the coffee with him back to the base, to run it through some tests, but somehow he'd gotten his mug and Joe's mug mixed up and now here he was, with Joe unconscious and drooling and, well. Maybe a little sex wouldn't hurt.

And, really, it wasn't so very different from having sex with a person who was awake. Maybe even a little better, Ken thought, since he didn't have to listen to the usual litany of "harder, harder, faster, faster" or worry about scratch marks or hickeys or black-eyes -- although maybe that time had just been a fluke.

He fucked Joe, slowly, and when he was done and he'd finished cleaning them both up and thrown the sheets into the washer, he sat down and stared at Joe, expression lax and unguarded for once, and the one thought that sprang into his mind was that, really, he wanted to do this again.

*

Things started to go bad right around the time he tried to remove Joe's pants.

"What the fuck?" Joe stared down at him and Ken sighed and sat back on his heels and said, "Don't act so surprised, Joe. I know you were drugging me."

"I wasn't!" Ken rolled his eyes and Joe stopped pretending. "Okay. So maybe I was. But. But I'm not -- and you're not and --"

"And what? We shouldn't have sex?" Ken gave another tug at Joe's pants. "That's probably the stupidest idea you've ever had."

"Yeah? Well, well, well, who's going to be the bottom, huh? Who's getting fucked?"

"You are," Ken said, and that was when Joe hit him. "Ow, fuck, what the hell was that for?"

"For deciding shit like that all on your own."

"Joe, it's just the natural order of things. I mean, look at your shirt. And now look at mine. Isn't it clear who's in charge here?" Ken rubbed at his jaw and glared at Joe who just glared back. "Y'know, I think I liked having sex with you better when you weren't conscious."

"Yeah? Yeah?" Joe's shoulders were starting to hunch and his fists were balling up, and really Ken was almost ready to call it quits and see about investing in a blow dart kit, and that was when Joe kissed him, hard and fast and with teeth and tongue and if Ken had thought sex with a passive Joe had been good, this was better. A lot better, hot and harsh and demanding, and he had Joe pressed up against his back and growling obscene nothings in his ear before he knew he'd lost the battle and Joe was in him, holding him down as he bucked and twisted and drowned in the pleasure Joe wrung from his body.

He was panting for a good long while after he came, and sweating, and aching just a bit, like he did sometimes when he pushed his body a little too hard after not pushing it at all for a long time. Joe's fingernails had left long, crisscrossing welts on his belly, and they stung a bit as the sweat dripped into them.

It was definitely not like the times before, and Ken kind of liked the messy, sticky, sweaty nature of this kind of sex.

"So?" Joe said, and his voice was even rougher from the growling, gasping, grunting sounds he'd made when he'd come. "Still think the other way's better?"

"Dunno." Ken looked around for a piece of cloth to wipe the mess off of his stomach, and ended up using the hem of Joe's shirt. And, okay, that was another good thing about having sex with Joe while they were both awake -- he had someone else to help him clean up. Although, on the other hand, he didn't think they'd destroyed quite as much furniture when he'd fucked an unconscious Joe. So maybe it was all a wash.

"Whaddaya mean you don't know?" Joe was grinning -- smirking, really. "Come on. You can't tell me you honestly like it better the other way.

"I mean, I don't know yet." Ken grinned at Joe, and grabbed him, held him down. "Guess we're going to have to try this way again."


	11. Trees (Jinpei, Joe)

It wasn't that Jinpei _hated_ this sort of thing, it was just that he didn't get why he was the one who had to suffer from Joe's occasional urges to do things like fly kites. He _especially_ didn't see why he was the one who had to inch along the branch and rescue said kite after Joe deliberately flew it into a tree.

"You got it?" Joe called up to him.

"Almost." He cut it free from where it was tangled up in its string like some strange insect caught in a giant spider web. "I'm gonna drop it down."

The kite twisted a little as it fell, and by the time he'd climbed back down -- skinning both his knees in the process -- Joe had already fixed the small tears and tied on a new piece of string. He handed Jinpei the spool and said, "Okay, you hold it and I'll run this time."

"Why are we doing this again?"

"Cause it's fun!"

Jinpei looked at the kite -- cheap paper and a bamboo frame, and you had to run to get it to do anything, and even then it'd just fly right into the nearest tree, or not catch enough of an updraft or something -- and then at Joe, who was grinning like this was the best thing ever.

He shrugged.

Sometimes he just really didn't get Joe's idea of 'fun'.

*

"Let's go through this one more time," Nambu said, rubbing his forehead. "You were on a mail run and what happened?"

"A tree lunged at me and tried to eat my plane," Ken said again.

"A tree lunged at you." Nambu took of his glasses and cleaned them on the edge of his lab coat. "Are you sure?"

"Hakase, I'm not making this up."

"I know, Ken. It's just. Why would a tree lunge at you?"

"I dunno, maybe it was extra hungry," Joe said, and he folded his arms defensively when the other two turned to stare at him. "What? Damn things eat my kites all the time."


	12. Freedom (Ken/Joe)

The one thing that Ken had absolutely not expected from Joe when they'd tried fucking instead of fighting as a measure of relieving the tension between them that always seemed to build up whenever the two of them were in the same room together, was that Joe would be obsessed with the way Ken tasted. Not that Ken was going to complain much, since this obsession apparently made Joe's eyes go dark with lust and growl out, "Jesus, Ken, you--" and then give him a truly spectacular blow job in what was probably a custodian's storeroom, although Ken was just a little too preoccupied with keeping his knees from giving out at the moment to bother checking to see if his assumption was right.

"Oh fuck." Ken thrust up and when the world stopped exploding, Joe was grinning at him and licking his lips, and Ken couldn't move fast enough to dodge Joe's kiss.

Ken wrinkled his nose at the bitter taste of his own come and said, "Not that I mind, but why do you like it so much?"

Joe shrugged. "Dunno. Guess I like the taste."

"Yeah? Why's that."

Joe shrugged again and said, "Well. It's. I dunno. It tastes like--"

Joe frowned, a little, and Ken decided that no matter how pleasantly boneless he was feeling at the moment, he'd probably still have to kill Joe if Joe said anything as pointlessly romantic as 'it tastes like freedom' or some such tripe, because that was a sign that this whole sexual release thing had obviously caused severe damage to Joe's brain and that'd mean they'd have to stop, and then Ken would never have fabulous blow jobs in antiseptic-smelling closets again, and that was just unacceptable.

"Taste like?"

"Tastes like you," Joe said, and Ken grinned.


	13. Boy Scout (Ken/Joe)

They never choose the same place twice, because they're both just that paranoid, and Joe isn't sure if he's following Ken or if Ken's following him, or if this is some side effect of the suits or just them, but they always arrive at the same time, as if they planned this in advance. But it isn't planned, and it isn't spoken about, and it just is, like so many things.

He's barely turned his engine off before Ken is on him, pushing him down, kissing him fiercely and tugging at his pants, and it's nothing like fighting, except that it's exactly the same in the way it makes his heart race and his breath come hard and fast. Ken's touch is devastatingly soft, brushing across his senses like a falling shadow. It burns and he arches up into it, banging his arm on the rearview mirror of his car.

Ken laughs at him, sits back against Joe's legs to do so, and in his unguarded moment Joe strikes, flips Ken over until he's the one on top and its Ken who's got the gearshift sticking into the small of his back. He bends down and his touch is not gentle, not drifting, but sure and confident and he knows Ken's body well enough now to make it hum and roar like the engines of his cars.

"More," Ken demands, gasps, and he tugs again at Joe's pants. Joe is more than happy to oblige and he sheds them quickly, kicking them away to land where they will. He uses the motion to kick open the glove compartment, and catches the condoms and lube before they fall to the ground.

"Interesting," Ken says. "And here I was expecting maps."

"Be prepared, right?" And even as he says that he can feel the sun beating down on his back and he knows that he's going to be tender tomorrow.

"You weren't a boy scout."

"No, but I fucked one for a while."

Ken laughs again and Joe kisses him to shut him up and for a while it's grunting and moaning and the creaking of the car as they rock it with their thrusting. In a corner of his mind, Joe worries a little about his shocks.

They lie together for a while after, and Joe takes the opportunity to look around, see where his clothes have fallen. His underwear looks perfect where it hangs off the tilted rearview mirror, and he idly contemplates leaving them there for the drive back. The beeping of Ken's bracelet saves him the trouble of having to seriously decide whether he's just lazy enough, right now, to leave his underwear where it is or pull it back on. Ken pushes him off and vaults out the car, and there's no laughter in his eyes. Nothing there but the Eagle.

"No rest for the wicked," Joe says, mostly to himself, as he gears up again.

"And we're the wickedest of them all," Ken tells him.

Joe would argue, but it's true.


	14. Red Impulse (Ken/Joe)

Joe slammed him up against the wall and Ken snarled and tried to punch him, but Joe had better leverage and managed to get Ken's arms between them before he could do much of anything.

"Get off me," Ken spat.

"Not a chance in hell," Joe said, and then he kissed Ken, harsh and violent. Ken bit him and Joe body-checked him into the wall and undid the snap on Ken's pants, because he could feel Ken's erection bumping against his leg when Ken tried to knee him in the groin.

"Calm down," Joe hissed into Ken's ear and wrapped his hand around Ken's cock and squeezed until Ken gasped and thrust up and the fight took on an entirely different edge. Ken bit him again, this time on the side of the jaw, and Joe growled and thrust against Ken and it was all blood and grunting until Ken shuddered and held very still as he came.

"Calm down," he said again, and this time Ken sagged against him and Joe knew it was as close to breaking down as he'd ever get.

"It's my dad," Ken said.

"Yeah," Joe said. "It sucks. But I'm the vengeance-crazed one, remember? I need you to calm down. I _need_ you."

"Okay," Ken said, slowly. "Okay."


	15. Outside Looking In (Jun)

It took Jun a couple of weeks to figure out that Joe and Ken were fucking (and she refused to call it 'sleeping together' because that was too nice a term for what they were doing) because it wasn't exactly rare for either of them to show up with a black eye or a bruise the shape of someone's fist, and they were the only two people Jun knew who could actually carry out an entire conversation in absolute silence. And it wasn't anything really big that tipped her off – no catching them kissing in a corner, no hickeys, no bite marks. Just small things that added up until one day she looked at the two of them, sitting there in silence, Ken fingering a bruise on his cheek and glaring, and knew that Ken had gotten that bruise while fucking Joe.

She won't call it sleeping together, and she won't call it love, because as long as it's neither of those things she can tell herself that it isn't real.


	16. Sweetness, Light (Ken/Joe)

Their one official, actual, honest-to-god, traditional date was pretty much doomed when Joe showed up at Ken's door bearing flowers and Ken laughed hard enough to force tears from his eyes.

That was, pretty much, the highlight of the evening.


	17. Mountains (Joe/Ken)

Ken leaned over his knees and sucked in great mouthfuls of air until his head stopped pounding and the black spots quit dancing before his eyes. He straightened slowly, readjusting his balance to compensate for the pack, and squinted up the mountain at Joe, who was smirking even more than normal.

If it hadn't been so hard to breathe, Ken would have done something to wipe that smug look off of Joe's face, but in the thin cold air all he could do was shift his pack and keep on climbing until they reached the arbitrary point that Joe decided was the campsite for the night. Ken gently lowered himself to the ground and let the pine-soaked air invade his lungs.

"I'm in better shape than you," he said, at last. "Why aren't you huffing and puffing?"

"Dissolute youth," Joe said. "All that smoking really mitigates the whole not being used to getting enough oxygen to the muscles thing."

"Uh huh." Ken took the bottle of water Joe offered him and drank greedily. "I'm surprised they don't put that on the packets."


	18. Exploding Cement Truck (Jun)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I suppose apologies should be made to the Mythbusters (aka: Team Prove The Science Behind The Myth) for sticking them into Gatch verse (aka: Team We Don't Believe In Your Puny Earth Physics)

"Now, see, why can't we ever do that?" Jun said and Ken looked up and blinked a couple of times because he hadn't been aware that they had been having a conversation.

"What?"

"That," Jun said and gestured at the T.V where two guys were in the process of blowing up a cement truck.

"Um." Ken coughed and scratched at his hairline with the end of his pen. "Because it's stupid and a waste of resources?"

"Okay, yes, but besides that."

"Well, they're pretty big reasons not to do it. Also, we don't own a cement truck."

"I bet I could find one."

"Yeah, and I still wouldn't let you blow it up."

Jun scowled at him, pure petulance from the top of her head to the soles of her shoes. "Aw. You never let me have any fun."


	19. Giant Peeps (Ken, Joe, Nambu)

"This is ridiculous," Ken said, and Joe nodded and said, "Yes, but also fiendishly clever."

Ken turned toward Joe, blinking at him rapidly the way he did when he was trying to not haul off and hit him. "What?"

"Oh come on, look at them. They're cute and adorable and we're going to look like such assholes when we go and blow them up."

"Joe. They're destroying downtown."

"Well, yeah. I didn't say they weren't evil. I just said they were fiendishly clever."

Ken sighed and rubbed his forehead. "Okay. Whatever. Come on. Let's go kick some Peeps."


	20. Post-Mission Funk (Ken/Joe)

Ken gave him two days and then picked up a couple of cases of beer, activated the seven GPS modules he'd secretly installed in a varied assortment of Joe's possessions as well as the one that came pre-installed on Joe's phone, and set off to hunt him down.

It was actually very disappointing to find him within a half-hour, parked in a campground just outside the city limits. Disappointing but not that surprising because Joe wasn't stupid enough to try and haul his trailer about while six sheets to the wind – his normal reaction to coming down off of the mission-high.

Except tonight there was a campfire and leftover peeps stuck on sticks and Joe's mouth tasted of sugar and smoke and coffee.

"Joe?"

"New tradition," Joe said.

"Nice." Ken arched into Joe's touch, heart thundering in his chest and the snap and crackle of the burning wood behind him nothing at all like the white-noise static of silent radio waves that buzzed in his ears. "But we're not wasting all that beer."


	21. Joe, Ken, talking about Jun

Joe waited until they were in the car before he asked, "What crawled up your ass and died?"

"Nothing," Ken said, but it didn't take a (self-proclaimed) expert in Knowing When Ken Is Seriously Pissed to see that this proclamation was completely and total horseshit.

"Ok. Just checking." Joe put the car into gear and pulled out from the little alley behind the Snack J and thought to himself, _And I'm the bleedin' Queen of England_.

"It's not that I mind," Ken said about four blocks later. "It's just."

"What?"

"Do you have to be so obvious?"

"Obvious about what?"

"Jun."

"What d'you mean?"

"Joe. You were fucking her with your eyes." Ken paused and, because he really was a literalist, added. "Metaphorically, I mean."

"Was not," Joe muttered, which was only a half-lie because yes he had been checking her out but Jesus, it was Jun – even _thinking_ about sleeping with her was practically incest and gave him that itchy, mostly forgotten feeling that he needed to go find the nearest confessional and a liberal minded priest.

"Sure," Ken said and Joe could practically feel the same smug disbelief radiating off of Ken that he'd been feeling only minutes ago.

"Fine," Joe said as he pulled up in front of Ken's shack. "So maybe I was looking at her legs a little. But come on," he added as Ken got out of the car and slammed the door just a little bit harder than he needed to. "She's got great legs."

"I wouldn't know," Ken said like the prim little prig he sometimes believed himself to be. "I don't look."

"Too bad. You're missing out," Joe said, and then he reached out and grabbed Ken's ass and grinned his You're Going To Be Naked And Sweating But In A Good, Dirty Way In A Couple Of Minutes grin and added, "Can't hold a candle to your ass, though."


	22. Wiiiii! (Joe, Ken, Jun, Jinpei, Ryu)

**Joe & Jinpei driving Ryu nuts**

"You're cheating."

"Am not."

"Are so."

"Not."

"So."

"Not."

"God damn – if this was a real boxing game, I'd totally be kicking your ass!"

"Hey, not my fault that you suck at video games."

"I do not suck at video games. You're just cheating."

"Am –"

"Oh for the love of all that's sacred, if the two of you don't shut up I'm going to take that stupid thing and use it as a weight on my fucking crab nets."

"Sorry Ryu."

"Yeah, whatever."

Sweet Buddha on a bicycle, Ryu thought as he turned back to the GodPhoenix. He never should have bought Jinpei that Wii for Chirstmas.

 

 **Jinpei, Ryu and Hakase**

Theoretically Hakase was a relatively easy going kind of a guy. He tended to have a very Ninjatai will be Ninjatai attitude toward some of their less…well-planned endeavors. However, Ryu was sure that even Hakase had a breaking point, a line that he just would not let them cross.

If he was a wagering man, he'd bet his boat that McGuyvering the weapons systems on the GodPhoenix through a Wii system fell somewhere on the _wrong_ side of that line.

 

 **Ken, Jinpei and the Wii**

"Ken!" Joe shouted and Ken winced because Joe had a very penetrating voice at times. "Ken, the Monkey's done something _bad_!"

"I'm not a fucking monkey!" Jinpei shouted back in a voice that was somewhat higher than normal – a condition that Ken was sure was the result of Joe holding him up by the back of his shirt and not because Jinpei was experiencing first hand what happens when testosterone plays merry hell with the vocal cords.

"Watch your language," Ken said, somewhat offhandedly and more out of a sense of guilty obligation to the currently absent Jun than any real objection to Jinpei's swearing. "And put him down, Joe."

"Oh no. I'm keeping him right here so you can give him the smacking he so richly deserves," Joe said, and there was something almost gleeful in his tone.

"Uh huh. And what, exactly, has he done?"

"So I'm doing a check of the weapons systems and I get to the firing mechanism and what should pop out but this thing," Joe said and shook the white sticks in his other hand viciously and in a way that had Jinpei looking very nervous.

"And these would be…?"

"…controls to a Wii…" Jinpei muttered. "I was just havin' some fun."

"Uh huh." Ken took the controls from Joe and turned them over carefully. He lined up his targets on the scope, swung, released, and felt the gratifying tremor of a faux explosion going off, indicating that he'd hit his target.

"I don't know," he said, handing the controls back to Joe. "I think it might be an improvement."

 

 **Jun, Hakase, responsibilities**

After the Great Wii Debacle, Hakase pulled Jun aside and said, "Jun, we need to talk."

Jun wisely kept her mouth shut because, so far, she was the only person smelling like roses in this whole fuck-up and she'd like to keep it that way. Of course when Hakase started shuffling the paperwork on his desk and coughing in an awkward fashion, she began to wonder if this "talk" was even going to be about that whole Wii thing or if she was in for what Joe described as "The most horrific and permanently scarring 45 minutes of my life" – also known as The Sex Talk From Hakase.

"Jun," Hakase began, and then pulled off his glasses and cleaned them on the edge of his shirt. "Jun, we need to talk about being…responsible."

"Responsible?" Jun parroted back and felt the first icy fingers of fear playing scales down her spine. Sweet Buddha this _was_ going to be The Talk.

"Yes. About being responsible, and about instilling that responsibility in others. Now I appreciate that some of your teammates are little…impulsive and some of that impulsiveness can be blamed on high spirits, but I had hoped that you would provide a…calming influence and yet, in the moment of crisis, where were you? Off getting a tan on some beach somewhere when I – when your team needed you. I thought you were more responsible than that."

"Wait," Jun said, relief at the fact that this was _not_ The Talk making her more reckless than usual. "Are you saying the whole Wii thing was my fault because I was taking some well-deserved vacation time?"

"Jun," Hakase said, looking pained, "you left Jinpei alone with Ryu and Joe for three days. I thought you knew better than that."

Jun opened her mouth. Closed it. Nodded firmly because, well, Hakase did have a point. "You're right, sir. I'm sorry. It'll never happen again."


	23. It's a tough job...(Ken/Joe)

"You want me to what?" Ken said.

Hakase coughed somewhat embarrassedly and began to clean his glasses on his shirttail. "You heard me."

"Sir, I—"

"No excuses, Ken. He's your responsibility. You knew that going into this whole thing." Hakase put his glasses back on and leaned back so the light reflected blindingly off them and kept Ken from seeing his eyes. "I've made certain…arrangements for you. You'll find all the information in that envelope."

"But—" Ken closed his mouth and stood up. "Yes sir."

The manila envelope was disturbingly heavy in his hands, and Ken waited until he was safely in the locked privacy of his car before he opened it up. An assortment of heavy, glossy magazines poured out onto his lap, along with a thick packet of driving directions to the more…sophisticated fetish shops in town, the key to a motel room, and a credit card with a post-it note saying, "Take whatever means necessary. Spare no expense."

Ken sighed and pulled out his cell phone.

Joe picked up on the third ring.

"Yeah?"

Ken tucked the phone between his cheek and his shoulder and put his car into gear. "I'm coming to get you in fifteen minutes. Don't go anywhere."

"That an order?" Joe said, and Ken could _hear_ the smirk in his voice.

"Yeah, Joe, it is." Ken glanced down at the leather-heavy magazines on his lap. "And you know what happens when you disobey orders."

Joe laughed, smoky and smoldering and slow like lava. "Yeah, I do," he said, and then the low ring of the dial tone filled Ken's ears.

Ken sighed. It was a tough job having a sexually adventurous, always-on boyfriend, but somebody had to do it.


	24. Two halves, same coin (Ken/Joe)

Junie said that they were two halves of the same coin, and she was right except that it was a coin with two heads, one that smiled and one that scowled, and it was just chance to figure out which half would end up looking out on the world. Junie thought that they were different, but Joe knew that they were the same coin, made of the same things. Same material, when you got right down to it, same hearts although Ken had managed to cover up the violence a little bit better.

But Joe knew the truth, knew that the only reason Ken smiled was because he was there to slouch, boneless and over-the-line insubordinate, and scowl.

Yeah, he needed Ken to pull him back off the fine line between doing the job and enjoying the death.

But Joe knew.

Ken needed him too.


	25. Discipline (Ken, Jun, Jinpei)

"Two weeks house arrest," Ken said and Jinpei started protesting immediately.

"That's not fair! It's not my fault that Joe –"

"Two weeks," Ken said again, wearing his Eagle face. "Do you want to make it three?"

"Fine," Jinpei muttered and he slouched out of the room. Ken sighed – a nearly imperceptible exhalation – and turned to Jun.

"Well?" he said. "Do you have anything to add?"

"No." Jun raised her chin and stared him right in the eye. "Except that the expression on Joe's face was totally worth it."

Ken sighed. "Three weeks suspension," he said, and he waited until Jun had left before he let leaned against his desk and gave in to the urge to rub his temples.

Honestly. Slipping Viagra into Joe's beer.

What had those two been thinking?


	26. Morning Beer (Joe/Ken)

"Oh you have got to be kidding me."

"What?" Joe said around his mouthful of cereal.

"That's just disgusting?"

" _What_?"

"That," Ken said and gestured to the bowl in front of Joe.

Joe looked down. "It's cereal. Cheerios. How can Cheerios be disgusting?"

"They're floating in a bowl of _beer_."

"Yeah? So?"

"So? That's just. That's just wrong."

Joe shrugged and ate another spoonful. "Not my fault you were out of milk."


	27. Things Explode (Jun)

The very first time they had her defuse a bomb, she cut the blue wire and killed them all.

Afterwards, Ken grabbed her in the corridor and said, "I said the red wire. The _red_ one."

"Um. Yeah," Jun said, slowly. "About that whole red/blue thing. Um. Thing is. I'm color blind."

"Oh." Ken opened his mouth then closed it. He cleared his throat. "Okay. Um. Well. I guess we'll just. Work something else out."


	28. Teeth (Ken/Joe)

It takes Ken exactly three – what? sessions? hook ups? frantic, desperate, grunting, fucks? -- well, whatever it is that he and Joe do, to figure out that Joe's got a thing for teeth.

Not in a weird, creepy, clown-fetish-y kind of way. Just. Well.

Ok, so the third time, when their fist fight turned into a fuck fight (and that, really, is the best term for it, Ken decides, because they're still fighting each other – top, bottom, who gets to come first, who _wins_ ) Ken scraped his teeth down the path of Joe's jugular and Joe jizzed his pants. (And, yes, Ken totally won that time. If you count winning as making Joe come too quickly and ending up with a raging hardon that he has to take care of himself.)

So, the next time they're getting down to business – and Ken's made sure they're both totally naked so that this time, even if Joe goes a bit too fast, at least he'll provide some sort of friction so Ken can get off too – Ken gently nips at Joe's ear right as Joe is about to try and flip him over.

The reaction is almost exactly what Ken hoped for, because Joe freezes in that way that's not really a freeze – arms trembling, pupils dilated down to pin points, brain very clearly somewhere else. Ken uses the opportunity push Joe on his back, and in the half-second between Joe realizing what, exactly, is happening to him and then doing something about it, Ken's already got Joe's legs over his shoulders and is halfway inside him.

"Bastard," Joe says, but without any real force.

Ken just smiles.


End file.
